Friday, March 11, 2005

As the competition to manage Los Alamos National Laboratory nears,Northrop Grumman Corp. has assembled a team to run head-tohead with theUniversity of California and Bechtel National.

Northrop Grumman will have the lead role in a partnership with CH2M Hillof Denver, which would handle environmental cleanup and manufacturetriggers for nuclear weapons. “We’re pressing ahead,” David Amerine ofCH2M Hill said in an interview Thursday. A third player, Teledyne Brown,would cover minor aspects of operations. The team hasn’t settled on auniversity partner yet.

Last week in Washington, D.C., the trio met with the board overseeing thecompetition . Amerine said his team suggested ways to make the contestless slanted toward the University of California, the lab’s operator sinceits inception in 1943.

The scoring system in the request for proposals — a draft document at thispoint — puts too much weight on science and technology and not enoughemphasis on environmental cleanup and the manufacturing of triggers,Amerine said.

In the latest version of the bidding criteria, the government increasedthe amount of money the next lab operator could make, from the previousfigure of $30 million a year to about $60 million. The Northrop Grummanteam suggested raising the lucre even higher along with higher financialrisk, or offering a small base fee with the possibility to earn much moredepending on good performance .

At last week’s meeting, the trio asked federal officials how serious theEnergy Department is about bringing management change to Los Alamos.

“I genuinely have the impression that the Department of Energy isinterested in change,” Amerine said, “but there are other politicalfactors at play.”

After a series of security, safety and business lapses in the past fewyears, then-Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham and Congress decided toput the Los Alamos management contract out to bid for the first time inhistory . A new contractor could be selected as soon as October .

Bidders will be scored, in part, on the senior laboratory leadership theypropose. Northrop Grumman has taken the bold move of advertising five toppositions at LANL, including the deputy director’s seat, in The WashingtonPost and elsewhere.

UC regents have yet to vote on whether to enter the competition and won’tdo so until the final request for proposals is published. However, theuniversity is reviewing potential senior managementteam members andconsidering a full range of candidates, including the incumbents, schoolspokesman Chris Harrington said.

The University of California and Northrop Grumman, which has offices inNew Mexico, could turn out to be the top two contenders; however , someinterested parties are choosing to keep silent. Nuclear Watch of NewMexico — in concert with other anti-nuke groups — is gearing up for thecompetition.

Those who say they’ve dropped out of the race as prime bidders include:Lockheed Martin Corp., Battelle Memorial Institute, University of Texas,Texas A & M University and Computer Sciences Corp.

Maybe you shouldn't overestimate the support a certain person has in the US Navy, even among his contemporaries. We are perfectly satisfied that he has managed to run aground at 7,000 feet ABOVE SEA LEVEL.

"The scoring system in the request for proposals ... puts too much weight on science and technology and not enough emphasis on environmental cleanup and the manufacturing of triggers"

Isn't LANL's primary mission science and technology?

They also feel they should get more money? To do what? Just hire a new director/senior management team and write their annual performance appraisals. If a new contractor takes over, they will have to show (DOE/Congress/Tax Paying Public) major visible changes around LANL that go beyond just replacing UC on the business cards and letterhead if they want to justify a $60 million fee every year.

I surfed around the Northrop Grumman (NG) website and found nothing that would indicate to me that they have the experience to really run such a huge and complex operation as LANL. Especially when its the Information Technology section that has the posting for future positions at LANL if they win the contract.

http://www.northropgrumman.com

http://www.it.northropgrumman.com/index.asp

I also suspect that one of the first things NG would do is have its lawyers shut down this blog. Similar to what Yahoo did when one of its employees started a blog - they also fired him. They claimed his comment that "Yahoo was doing very well" might be considered insider information and get the company in hot water with the SEC. I doubt NG would put up with this public airing of LANL's (and NG's) internal issues and specific discussions on how well NG does its business - wouldn't want NG stockholders/investors get skittish about their stock prices by thinking NG wasn't running LANL properly.

And as far as CH2M Hill goes, they seem to excel at cleaning up closed military bases and decommissioned DOE nuclear sites.

http://www.ch2m.com/corporate_2004/

It seems like DOE/Congress needs to decide what sort of lab they want LANL to become under a new contractor; a world class institution based on a college campus model with academic freedom and creativity as its pillars or one based on the standard industrial model with customer/stockholder satisfaction and returns on investments as its guiding principles.

We're witnessing the looting of the Federal government by politicallyconnected corporations. Take the cash and run, cowboys. Yeee Hawww!

NG is a big contributor to the dominant political party in America.They are also a large reason why the situation in Iraq is currently so FU'ed. Read below about Northrop Grumman's company, Vinnell Corp.

And you thought our friends at Halliburton/KSL were bad with the facilities contract at LANL? Just wait till NG takes over:

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/17627/

-------------------------------------------------------------------Vinnell's Army on the Defensive

Forget Halliburton. The vice president's former company may keep getting the headlines for its hefty contracts in Iraq and Pentagon overcharging, but it's not the private company that's so badly botched the training of the new Iraqi Army that the Jordanian Army has been hastily brought in to finish the job.

That firm is Vinnell Corp. of Alexandria, Va., owned by politically connected Northrop-Grumman. Its errors in training a new Iraqi Army have undermined the creation of one of the most important institutions in a post-Saddam Iraq—a national army, senior American intelligence and military analysts say.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

And I agree with the poster who said NG will probably send theirlawyers to Doug's front door and shut this blog down in no timeflat if they take the contract. Heck, they may even do it before that time if they feel it is hurting their odds at winning the RFP.

LANL will have bigger problems than who the Director is if NG is chosen.

I can tell you that Northrop, before they consolidated to become NG, had the WORST reputation as a place to work in Southern California among engineers. These guys were the first to lay people off when things got tough.

These guys are not stupid and they are not wimps. If they decide they need to get rid of people, they will do so in a manner so they are tough to sue. That might be an entire organization, say a Division, or a system based on seniority, or maybe everyone who is not "protected" in some manner. They definitely believe that if they need someone, they'll just put out an ad and hire them, just as they are doing now.

I've said it several times before, and I'll say it again, most people here have no clue just how different working for these type of companies will be.

As far as Bechtel, they're a construction firm from way back. There is no touting of science and technology on their website. They do what they do and make no pretension of doing anything else. They are operations focused. Do you think they are doing S&T in Nevada?